Concept Studio
See the idea. Put it to the test.
956 activities from Kindergarten to Year 12, in 13 subject areas. A practical gives the idea, what you need, the steps, what you should see and a safety card. A teacher-led demonstration gives the idea and its hazards; its method is for tutors on the learning platform.
Review
Reviewed before publication (owner’s confirmation, 24 September 2026). That covers every activity here, and a practical’s page lists the sources its author read.
A safety card on every page
The risk, who supervises and the hazards. The 38 teacher-led demonstrations show their idea and hazards here; their materials, steps and sources, and any result, control or note that states a number or an amount, are for tutors and administrators on the learning platform.
School laboratory, not for home
207 activities are medium or high risk. Each says so on its page: In a school laboratory, with a teacher supervising, under the school's risk assessment. Not for home.
Curriculum references
Each activity lists the NSW syllabus outcomes and Australian Curriculum v9 codes it supports. They are references, not a verified or complete curriculum alignment.
Find an activity
956 activities
Every subject and year · page 17 of 20
The sum of two dice: sample space, relative frequency and expected value
Thirty-six equally likely outcomes give the sum of two dice a triangular distribution, and relative frequencies from hundreds of real rolls settle towards it as the number of rolls grows.
Practical, model not builtLow riskThree cups and a coin: conditional probability and the stick-or-switch game
When a host who knows where the prize is always reveals an empty cup, switching wins two times in three, which a tree diagram predicts and 60 real trials confirm.
Practical, model not builtLow riskTide heights from Bureau of Meteorology predictions modelled by a cosine curve
Tide predictions for a harbour rise and fall close to a cosine curve whose period, amplitude and centre line the learner reads from real data, and whose equation then predicts later high waters.
Practical, model not builtLow riskWalking pace as a linear model, and time against speed as a reciprocal one
Steady walking gives distance in direct variation with time, the gradient is the speed, and the time for a fixed distance varies inversely with that speed.
Practical, model not builtLow riskWhat an appliance costs to run: measured energy in kilowatt-hours and the household bill
Power is a rate of energy use, so kilowatts multiplied by hours gives kilowatt-hours, and a measured kilowatt-hour figure multiplied by the tariff on a bill gives a running cost.
Practical, model not builtMedium riskWhy A4 is 210 by 297: the surd sqrt 2 and index laws in the A-series paper sizes
A sheet that keeps its shape when folded in half must have sides in the ratio sqrt 2 : 1, and fixing A0 at one square metre makes every A-size an exact power of 2 that the index laws predict.
Practical, model not builtLow riskA lift ride: integrating measured acceleration to find speed and height
The area under an acceleration-time graph is the change in velocity and the area under the velocity-time graph is the change in height, which a phone in a lift measures directly.
Practical, model not builtLow riskA reducing balance home loan and a credit card balance at current RBA rates
Each month a loan balance grows by interest and falls by the repayment, so a spreadsheet of the reducing balance shows why early repayments are mostly interest and why extra repayments save so much.
Calculation and dataLow riskA thrown ball as a vector-parametrised curve, with skew lines measured in the room
A position vector that depends on a parameter traces a curve, while a point and a direction vector describe a straight line, and the scalar product then settles how far a point lies from a line and whether two lines in three dimensions meet or pass each other.
Practical, model not builtLow riskA vector walk: adding displacements on bearings
Two legs walked on bearings add as vectors, and the resultant displacement the learner tapes back to the start is the vector sum, not the sum of the leg lengths.
Practical, model not builtLow riskBouncing ball: bounce heights as a geometric sequence with a limiting sum
Each bounce returns a fixed fraction of the previous height, so the heights form a geometric sequence and the total distance travelled is a finite limiting sum.
Practical, model not builtLow riskDice decay: exponential decay and half-life with 100 dice
When every item has the same chance of being removed each round, the number left falls by a constant fraction per round and halves after a fixed number of rounds.
Practical, model not builtLow riskDraining a funnel: related rates and Torricelli's law
When water drains from a cone through a small hole, the depth falls at a rate linked to the volume rate by the chain rule, and the link changes as the surface shrinks.
Practical, model not builtLow riskDrop height against bounce height: scatterplot, correlation and least-squares line
Two measured variables with a physical link give a scatterplot whose strength and direction a correlation coefficient measures and whose trend a least-squares line predicts, within the measured range only.
Practical, model not builtLow riskFilling vessels at a steady rate: height-time graphs for a cylinder and a cone
The same steady inflow gives a straight height-time graph in a cylinder and a curved one in a cone, because the rate of rise depends on the surface area at the current height.
Practical, model not builtLow riskHow fast does a car lose value: declining balance depreciation from advertised prices
A car loses a roughly constant fraction of its value each year, so real advertised prices by age follow a declining-balance curve rather than a straight line.
Practical, model not builtLow riskHow many people can leave per minute: network flow through measured doorways
The largest flow through a network of doorways and corridors is limited by its narrowest cut, so widening the wrong doorway changes nothing.
Practical, model not builtLow riskMass on a spring and a conical pendulum: period against mass, radius and angle
A restoring force proportional to displacement gives simple harmonic motion whose period depends on the mass and the stiffness and not on the amplitude, and resolving the tension in a whirled line gives a conical pendulum whose period depends on the line length and the cone angle and not on the mass.
Practical, model not builtLow riskMeans of dice: the sampling distribution of the mean and the central limit theorem
A single die is flat, but the mean of ten dice is bunched around 3.5 with a spread that shrinks with the square root of the sample size, and its distribution looks normal although the population does not.
Practical, model not builtLow riskSetting up the hall: critical path analysis from timed activities
When activities depend on one another, the longest chain of dependent activities fixes the shortest possible completion time, and activities off that chain have float.
Practical, model not builtLow riskSimple and compound interest at a real savings rate from the Reserve Bank
Compound interest adds interest to the balance each period, so the balance grows geometrically, and compounding more often at the same annual rate adds slightly more each time.
Calculation and dataLow riskSuperannuation as an annuity: 12 per cent super guarantee over a working life
Equal contributions that each earn compound interest add to a geometric series, so the future value of an annuity has a closed form and grows much faster than the sum of the contributions.
Calculation and dataLow riskTower of Hanoi: 2^n - 1 moves, from pattern to proof by induction
Counting the fewest moves for one, two, three and four discs suggests 2^n - 1; counting how often each disc moves turns the total into the sum 1 + 2 + ... + 2^(n-1), and mathematical induction proves that this sum equals 2^n - 1 for every n.
Practical, model not builtLow riskTwo measured tones added as phasors: the Argand plane on a phone oscilloscope
Two tones of the same frequency add like two complex numbers: the modulus of the sum is the amplitude a microphone reads and its argument is the phase of the combined wave, so head-to-tail addition on the Argand plane predicts a measurement.
Practical, model not builtLow riskVolume of a flask, a horizontal pipe and a bottle neck, checked with water
The measured profile of a vessel decides the form of the integral that gives its volume: a straight taper needs a linear substitution, a circular cross-section needs a trigonometric substitution and the double-angle identity, and a hyperbolic taper needs a rational integrand, and water in a measuring cylinder settles whether the integration was right.
Practical, model not builtLow riskVolume of a rotated solid checked with water: a cone and a curved glass
Rotating a line or curve about an axis sweeps out a solid whose volume is the integral of pi y^2, and pouring water into the real object measures the same number.
Practical, model not builtLow riskWhere does the spinner stop: a continuous uniform random variable
The angle at which a fair spinner stops can take any value from 0 to 360 degrees, so probabilities come from areas under a flat density function rather than from counting outcomes.
Practical, model not builtLow riskBird's-eye view: from a model of the classroom to a pictorial map
A map shows places as they look from directly above, so objects keep their positions relative to each other when a room is drawn as a plan.
PracticalLow riskA term of weather and nature records beside a published Aboriginal seasonal calendar
Seasons can be read from plants, animals and weather in a place rather than from dates, and the Aboriginal calendar for a Country divides the year differently from the four-season calendar.
PracticalLow riskFeature walk: natural, managed and constructed features on a labelled map
Every feature of a local place can be sorted as natural, managed or constructed, and its position can be recorded on a map.
PracticalLow riskHow much water does our school use in a day
Water use can be measured in litres with a bucket and a timer, and a day's total for a place is the sum of many small uses.
Practical, model not builtLow riskMake a rain gauge and keep a monthly rainfall record
Rainfall is a depth of water spread over the ground, so a straight-sided container measures it in millimetres regardless of the container width.
Practical, model not builtLow riskWind vane, compass and a class wind rose
Wind has a direction that can be named by the compass point it comes from, and a month of daily readings shows which directions are most common at the school.
PracticalLow riskErosion trays: bare soil, mulched soil and turf under the same rain
Plant cover and mulch slow water and hold soil, so the same rainfall carries far less soil off a covered slope than off a bare one.
PracticalLow riskMeasure the playground and draw it to scale
A scale is a fixed ratio between map distance and ground distance, so measured ground lengths become map lengths by division.
Practical, model not builtLow riskStates, territories and neighbours on a real map, with scale-bar distances
Australia and its neighbours are located by direction and distance, and a printed scale bar turns a string length into kilometres.
Practical, model not builtLow riskWhere is Earth's water: dividing one litre by the real proportions
Almost all of Earth's water is sea water and most fresh water is ice or underground, so the water people draw from rivers and lakes is a tiny share.
Practical, model not builtLow riskCatchment model: where the rain goes
Rain that falls anywhere inside a catchment boundary drains to the same low point, carrying whatever is on the surface with it.
PracticalLow riskClimate graphs for two Australian stations from Bureau data
Two places at different latitudes have different patterns of monthly rainfall and temperature, and a climate graph makes the pattern comparable at a glance.
PracticalLow riskFire danger from the schoolyard: temperature, humidity and wind into the McArthur index
Fire danger is set by weather that can be measured, and it rises steeply with heat and wind and falls with humidity, which is why the same bush can be safe one afternoon and dangerous the next.
Practical, model not builtLow riskLatitude, longitude and the shortest route: string on a globe against a flat map
Latitude and longitude fix any place on the globe, and the shortest route between two places is a great circle, which a string pulled tight on a globe follows and a straight line on a flat map does not.
Practical, model not builtLow riskRead the bushfire prone land map around the school
Bush fire prone land is mapped by local councils and certified by the Commissioner of the NSW Rural Fire Service, so the hazard around a place can be read from an official map and measured with its scale.
PracticalLow riskSurface temperature survey of the schoolyard with an infrared thermometer
Surface cover chosen by people (asphalt, concrete, grass, shade trees) sets how hot a surface becomes in the sun, which is the mechanism behind urban heat.
PracticalLow riskAngle of repose: how steep a slope of loose material can stand
Loose material piles up to a fixed maximum angle that depends on the grains and their wetness, and a slope cut steeper than that angle fails.
PracticalMedium riskAquifer in a tank: porosity, permeability and a pumped well
Groundwater fills the pore space between grains; how much a layer holds is its porosity and how fast water moves through it is its permeability, and pumping a well lowers the water table around it.
Practical, model not builtLow riskContour lines from a model hill in a rising tank
A contour is the line where a level surface meets the land, so raising water in fixed steps around a model hill draws the contour map of that hill.
Practical, model not builtLow riskCreek discharge from a cross-section and float timing
Discharge is cross-sectional area multiplied by velocity, so a creek's flow in litres per second can be measured with a tape, a ruler and a floating orange.
Practical, model not builtMedium riskDune formation: wind over bare and planted sand
Wind moves dry sand grains and drops them where the wind slows, so any obstacle including plants starts a dune and holds it.
PracticalMedium risk
For tutors and administrators
The materials and steps of every teacher-led demonstration are on the learning platform, with the safety card first. Sign in with a tutor or administrator account to read them.